Hellobee Boards

It sounds okay. I just think maybe we should be more careful of what we type before hitting send, then there should be no need to delete.

What about allowing us to edit? maybe a 12-24 hour window to go back and remove accidentally identifying information, or something that is too personal for the interwebs?

I would stand by not allowing deletion, because I think it becomes a slippery slope. People should think before they post! If you really want to allow deleting, I think a lifetime maximum of 3 is reasonable, but maybe not entire threads, just individual posts.

@mrbee: that sounds good to me. You could have a hellobee logo in it's place, saying something about the post being removed by the poster.

@mrbee: Exactly, I think if just a post was deleted then a message just like you wrote would appear, just so you know that something was deleted (otherwise threads get confusing if something gets referenced later that is now gone). That way we would also know if it was a moderator or poster that removed it (it sometimes helps with context for the rest of the thread.

The reason I suggested that threads aren't removed, is that sometimes good advice/suggestions pop up on threads that if they were removed later are totally lost. If it is just posts deleted, the personal information is gone, but the info/advice is still available for everyone to see.

@mrbee: You would have to in that case, I would guess.

@mrbee: We could get fancy, but simply "hide" or "remove" would suffice.
Delete
Expunge
Junk
Oust
Purge

Or my favourite off the top of my head:
Withdraw

@mrbee: lol

I know what you mean about things getting ugly on WB, for example. I say as far as deletions go, you should have a somewhat strict policy similar to the WB one in general that is well known sooner rather than later.

However, since you want a bit more leeway, maybe you can program a way for users to maybe get to remove between 2-5 of their own posts? Maybe this is something that can be a yearly thing? Somehow when doing the programming there can be some sort of timer so that after a year a user gets their couple of deletions again? I know it might be tricky, but I see this site as a place where people will hang out for a good while. If you used up your 2, 3, or however many deletions in your first year, that would be a bummer for you if you've been around for say 3 years and really want to remove something.

Or this may be a REALLY unrealistic programming nightmare for you, but what about depending on how long you've been a member that is how many deletions you'll be able to do yourself? Like maybe start with 1 or 2 for your first year of membership and maybe once you hit your second year you'll get your original 2 plus one more and each year you get another?

However it turns out, I'm really excited to see what you end up deciding about this!

Personally, I prefer to not have threads deleted in their entirety. If you want to delete your post, fine, but a lot of the time when things get ugly, people have quoted it, so there's no point. I do that on purpose when someone says something really offending to me on another post so I have a "record" of it, if that makes sense (on boards where the quote feature is available).

If you posted something too personal, then that's a user's issue. You should be aware that you're posting on a site that is open to every one in the world with a computer and internet connection.

Agree with @blushink & @boogs... the 3 deletions I think is more than enough. People need to be their own filters and realize that this is a public forum and that deletion requests may not be as easy to run behind the scenes as it may seem for users.

I like the idea of three life time post deletions. People absolutely should know they are posting for the world to see but sometimes in the heat of the moment I'm sure common sense goes out the window. I would hope that even after 1 situation where someone needed to have a post deleted they would learn their lesson and never have to go through that again.

But I do think we need a longer editing window. Sometimes I'll notice something as minor as a spelling error in one of my posts when I go back to a thread later in the day and it makes me crazy that I can't fix it! And I like the idea of an automated time stamp that identifies the post as having been edited.

@mrbee: Done!

i agree with the above posters. i think it would be nice to delete your own comments (although, i'm really not sure why people would want to do it days after they posted) but not the whole thread. i think it gets too complicated for you (or whoever) to try to write a program that will give error messages when people try to access the thread or what not. maybe a small "x" next to your post?